Appropriate "Safety" Colleges for an MIT Applicant?

mia305
Mon, 24 Mar 2008 13:03:47 +0000

Depends on how you define safety. IMO most MIT applicants, at a minimum, should apply to their state university system as their “safety”. Many have very good programs, examples, Illinois, Purdue, even Florida. Obviously, the admissions standards/tuition are lower for instate. Some state schools of course are not merely very good, they are top tier, and I dont mean to imply that these are true safety schools, even for in state applicants. Then, depending on the specific credentials of the applicant, IMO you also should apply to a group of schools that you are relatively convinced (but by no means certain) that you can be admitted to. Depending on credentials, these can include say Johns Hopkins, Northwestern, CMU, Mudd, (maybe even Chicago, though not engineering per se, depending how things go with their admissions this year) and some of the top tier state schools. Then, of course, for lack of a better term, there are the “peer” schools and I suggest applying to several of these particularly if you think your stats are within reach of the mean of their admitted students (or above) and/or you have other distinguishing qualifications. I would include in these, MIT, Stanford, Berkeley (especially for OOS), CalTech, maybe Chicago and, in 5-10 years, Harvard SEAS. They all seem to cut the pie a little differently, so it pays to spread your bets. Just examples, I dont mean to exclude anyone.